This paper focuses on developments in the engagement of developing countries in the multilateral trading system in light of the recent re-issue of Robert Hudec’s seminal book, Developing Countries in the GATT Legal System. Starting in the late 1980s, just after Hudec published his book, a...

Extensive research has demonstrated the existence of large potential welfare gains from trade facilitation—measures to reduce the overall costs of the international movement of goods. From an equity perspective an important question is how those benefits are distributed across and within...

Poor countries are rarely challenged in formal WTO trade disputes for failing to live up to commitments, reducing the benefits of their participation in international trade agreements. This paper examines the political-economic causes of the failure to challenge poor countries and discusses the...

High levels of protection and domestic support for farmers in developed countries significantly affect many least developed countries (LDCs), both directly and through the price-depressing effect of agricultural support policies. High tariffs and domestic support may also lower the world price...

The Agreement on Trade Facilitation (TFA) embodies the first set of new multilateral rules to have been negotiated under auspices of the WTO, part of a small package of decisions centering on matters of interest to developing countries that was “harvested” from the broader Doha round. This...

In the first half of the 1990s many Central and East European countries (CEECs) experienced very high growth rates of exports to OECD nations. This paper investigates the contribution of sources of comparative advantage and economic restructuring on the pattern, composition and volume of trade....

International agreements increasingly constrain the ability of governments to use trade policies whereas few constraints apply to the use of investment policies. Using a model in which a local and a foreign firm compete in the domestic market, we analyse whether the foreign firm may be forced to...

This paper surveys the literature on trade in services, focusing on the policies that are used to restrict such trade, the gains from liberalization, and the institutional mechanisms that have been adopted in the pursuit of liberalization. It argues that technological progress and international...

Motivated by discussions in the World Trade Organization (WTO) on multilateral disciplines with respect to competition law, we develop a two-country model that explores the incentives of a less-developed country (LDC) to offer increased market access (via a tariff reduction) in exchange for a...